OSHA Enforcement in 2026: What Employers Need to Know About Interpretation Letters, Priorities, and Inspection
Federal OSHA enforcement and compliance guidance have always been central to employer risk management. But as we move deeper into
Institute of WorkComp Professionals
MISSION: The Institute trains, certifies, and mentors Independent Agents in a process that helps them write more business and gets better results for their clients.
Meet your new back-office secret weapon: Kevin Ring.
As the Institute’s Lead Analyst, Kevin has personally dissected over 1,400 Experience Mod worksheets. He finds the math errors that incumbents ignore.
When you join the Institute, you don’t just master how to analyze a mod—you get a team that helps you do it. You send us the prospect’s messy data; we send you back the “smoking gun” you need to close the deal.
The Institute Difference:
There are a great many insurance designations. Most of them have a very similar model:
That’s where it ends. Perhaps there is some flavor of a continuing education requirement, but the designation is the finish line.
Here at the Institute, our job is only beginning when you earn the Certified WorkComp Advisor Designation.
The institute offers three different designation programs. Our flagship is the certified work comp advisor, CWCA. The CWCA is targeted to producers and teaches the rules of workers' compensation that very few people, including insurance agents, understand and how to use that knowledge to write more business and get better results for their clients. The CWCA is offered in three different formats. You can take the course on demand, which is a hundred percent self paced, so you can work through it on your schedule. It's about twelve hours front to back, broken over twelve sessions. Obviously, that means they average an hour each, although some are a little more and some are a little less. Of the twelve sessions, eleven are video and one is audio only. I always like to point that out because many of us have been through online CE courses where they give you a five hundred page PDF and tell you good luck learning something. And that's not what our program is at all. We work to replicate the live seminar as much as possible. The course is also offered via Zoom. We do that over three days from ten thirty to two forty five eastern time each day. We occasionally do workshops in person. That's a two day class from eight to five the first day and eight to three the second day. The live versions of the course, whether they are on Zoom or in person, are approved for CE in most states. The on demand is not approved for CE yet. No matter how you take the course, it's the same curriculum, it's the same test at the end, it really just comes down to learning style and schedule what's the best fit. For your account managers, we have the certified work comp specialist, CWCS course. We created the CWCS not long after we started teaching the certified work comp advisor because producers were coming home from the class and asking their account managers for help, and they didn't know what to do or what they were talking about. So we created the CWCS to get account managers the fundamentals of the process so that they are in a position to help support you as you go out and implement the process. The CWCS takes about three and a half hours to complete and is offered as on demand video. Down the road, you can take the master work comp advisor course, MWCA. The master's goes deeper into everything that we talk about in the CWCA and CWCS. With the CWCA and CWCS, it doesn't matter where you're located or what rating bureaus you work with because the process is largely the same. Of course, some states have different experience mod calculations like California or New York or Pennsylvania, but those differences don't have much of an impact on how you implement the process. In the masters, we do split it up by rating bureau because most of the handouts are actually pages from the rating bureau manuals, and we're getting so deep into the specifics that it would be confusing to try and teach multiple rating bureaus at once. Designations are good for three years. There are several ways you can extend your designation. You can attend another CWCA or CWCS workshop. You can attend the master's course, which extends your CWCA or CWCS and gives you the opportunity to earn the master's. You can also accumulate institute credits by attending our live monthly webinars or watching recorded webinars on our member website. We'll talk about that later. The institute's designation programs are designed to help you become an expert in workers' comp, but they're only the first step.
The experience of Certified WorkComp Advisors over 24+ years confirms that more than 50% of the businesses you want to work with are overcharged for their Workers’ Compensation due to misclassification, claims mismanagement, and premium audit errors.
Your competitors – even the “big” agencies – are missing these errors.
The IWCP Process is not about selling insurance. It is about selling results.
The days of sounding alike, doing alike are over. The Institute is all about changing the conversation to help you:
• Write more business
• Get better results for your clients
• Help you turn your promises into performance so you keep those clients for life
As the Uncommon Training Company,™ the Institute works with you, turning your intellectual capital into financial capital. Learn it, Sell it, add new clients.
Membership in the Institute isn’t support. It’s an unfair advantage.
Becoming a member of the Institute allows you and your staff to earn the Certified WorkComp Advisor designation (Live or On-Demand) and Certified WorkComp Specialist designations. But that’s just the beginning! After earning your designation, you’ll have unlimited access to our team of experts for tactical support on closing and keeping your accounts.
This is a program designed to help you grow—not just so you can pass a test, but so you can take what you learn to grow your agency and get better results for your clients.
In over 30 years in the insurance industry, it has become extremely evident that certain relationships have proven to be invaluable to my success and the success of our agency. The Institute has proven time and time again to be one of the best resources that you can have that provides you with information, ideas, and a daily concern for your success in producing and retaining not only workers’ compensation accounts but helping you to stay on track as you grow. Do not miss the opportunity to build this relationship with the Institute. Your partnership with Preston and Kevin will not let you down.
Being affiliated with the Institute has been very, very good for my wallet. I’ve learned a lot of wonderful tools as well as just concepts for helping people understand how workers’ comp works.
Tim Hile – Ottawa Kent, Jenison, MI
Pres, “I truly did not know exactly what to expect when Kevin and you visited our agency It was really good with great ideas. Very cool.” I certainly did not think our team would receive the follow up it has. The in-agency Institute and follow up has changed how some producers now do business, and the other producers are “coming around.” Working closely with Steve, a 14 – year producer, has absolutely moved Steve from quoting to just “having a persuasive conversation” with potential clients. This has paid off in his best production year. We’re excited you are revisiting and looking forward to more of our producers embracing the Institute process and changing the way employers see our agency and their insurance.
Absolutely deserved by one of my favorite people in business. Preston transformed our agency from a pretty vanilla operation into a vital part of our community, saving lives through better understanding and
processes that produced incredible results for our clients. Thank you Preston!
First of all, thank you & the Institute for your communications recently on COVID-19 resources. As an agency, the insurance industry’s response to Business Income was our client’s biggest concern & questions for the first couple weeks. Now that has transitioned to Workers’ Comp and how the various States are treating COVID-19 claims and what employers need to know. So thank you for the helpful info, including the link to that attorney in IL’s memo as well as the link to the NCCI page for State’s legislative activity.
When Owen Taylor of Owen-Dunn Insurance Services was visiting Asheville, he told Kevin and me, “There is no better training to jump-start a producer than your work comp training. I can provide the other coverage learning in-house, but with your work comp training and support, producers have the confidence to move forward with all lines.
One 30 minute work comp review. That’s all it took for me to save this business owner $31,351 on his work comp.
They had been with the same agent for years and had never had a class code rate and credit review. They thought “work comp is what it is”. After one review I was able to show this business owner that nothing could be further from the truth….. *Just wait till I tell you next time about their audits.
Starts anytime!
February 24-26, 2026 Virtual CWCA (10:30AM to 2:45PM ET)
June 2-4, 2026 Virtual CWCA (10:30AM to 2:45PM ET)
March 17-19, 2026 Virtual MWCA (1030-230 ET Each Day)
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